The Pregnancy Plan by Grace Green

Author:Grace Green
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Harlequin
Published: 2013-12-15T00:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER EIGHT

“JACK’S wrong,” Dermid said. “I’ve no intention of marrying Abby O’Donnell.”

“Well, not necessarily marry her…but…nowadays lots of couples just live together without—”

“Lacey, the woman’s in a committed relationship with Mark Manley, one of the local sheep ranchers. What the devil made Jack think—”

“He overheard you saying to Arthur that Abby would make a top-notch rancher’s wife. I guess,” Lacey said, “he assumed you were talking about yourself.”

“Well, I wasn’t.” He crossed to the sink, ran the hot water. As he washed his hands, he said, “I’ve no intention of getting married again.”

“So you’re really going to be bringing up your baby alone?”

“We’ve talked about this before, you know what my plans are.” He rinsed his hands, and grabbing a towel from the rack, turned to face her as he dried them. “I coped with Jack after Alice died, I’ll cope with his little sister. I won’t be the first dad who’s had to bring up a baby alone.”

“Is that fair—especially to a little girl—to have to grow up without a mother?”

He tossed the towel down on the countertop. “Was it fair that Alice didn’t live to see her children grow up?”

“No, of course not, but—”

“Look, Lacey, making the decision to have this baby be born at all was the hardest thing I’ve ever had to do.” He crossed to the fridge. “And sure, there are going to be problems down the road but I’m determined not to anticipate them. I plan to take one day at a time, and I’d appreciate if you wouldn’t come up with doom and gloom scenarios—”

“I’m sorry. Okay,” she said. “One day at a time it is.”

“Good girl!” He opened the fridge door and looked in. “You’ve done a good job here.”

If Alice had been here, no matter how tired she might have been, she’d have busied herself making a snack for her man. Well, Lacey reflected, Dermid McTaggart wasn’t her man, and she had no intention of busying herself for him at this or any other time of night!

Stifling a yawn, she said, “I’m going to bed.”

He glanced around, his expression abstracted. “Okay,” he said. “See you in the morning.” And without further ado, he resumed his inspection of the fridge contents.

Contrarily she was peeved that he hadn’t even expected her to make a snack for him.

“Good night,” she said, and sashayed from the room, feeling unaccountably irritated. With herself.

The last thing she wanted was to become a slave to her brother-in-law. So why did she find herself wishing that she was a Cordon Bleu chef and could in the blink of an eye rustle him up a nutritious and delicious gourmet meal?

Next morning, Arthur arrived back at the ranch.

He loped into the kitchen just as Lacey and Jack were having breakfast. And when he saw Lacey, he stopped short. Then whipping off his battered, wide-brimmed hat, he stood there, a shy smile on his bony weather-beaten face.

“Hi, Ms. Maxwell. Sorry to barge in on you like this. I thought the boss might be here.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.